Peter Schmuck's Orioles grades for June 27

Nick Wass / AP

Though the Orioles struggled with RISP in Monday night’s rain-makeup road game, the offense produced consistently through the rest of the week, scoring at least five runs in six of the seven games and averaging nearly seven runs per game. The club obviously is known for its top-to-bottom power, but the emergence of contact hitters Hyun Soo Kim and Joey Rickard – as well as Adam Jones’ success in the leadoff role – has changed the chemistry of the offense. Who would have thought at the start of the season that the Orioles would be closing out June ranked second in the American League in on-base percentage. Didn’t see that coming.

Though the Orioles struggled with RISP in Monday night’s rain-makeup road game, the offense produced consistently through the rest of the week, scoring at least five runs in six of the seven games and averaging nearly seven runs per game. The club obviously is known for its top-to-bottom power, but the emergence of contact hitters Hyun Soo Kim and Joey Rickard – as well as Adam Jones’ success in the leadoff role – has changed the chemistry of the offense. Who would have thought at the start of the season that the Orioles would be closing out June ranked second in the American League in on-base percentage. Didn’t see that coming.

The band is finally back together again. Manny Machado returned from his four-game suspension on Friday night and J.J. Hardy is back playing regularly after missing six weeks with a broken bone in his foot. So, the Orioles are back playing the kind of defense everybody has come to expect – steady up the middle with regular flashes of spectacular glove work. Remember, this is a defense that had fallen to 20th in the majors in fielding percentage a few weeks ago, but I predicted it would be back in the top 10 by July 1. It’s going to be close. The O’s now rank 14th at .985 with the 10th ranked team at .986. This past week, the Orioles made just three errors in seven games.

The band is finally back together again. Manny Machado returned from his four-game suspension on Friday night and J.J. Hardy is back playing regularly after missing six weeks with a broken bone in his foot. So, the Orioles are back playing the kind of defense everybody has come to expect – steady up the middle with regular flashes of spectacular glove work. Remember, this is a defense that had fallen to 20th in the majors in fielding percentage a few weeks ago, but I predicted it would be back in the top 10 by July 1. It’s going to be close. The O’s now rank 14th at .985 with the 10th ranked team at .986. This past week, the Orioles made just three errors in seven games.

Every week, Orioles columnist Peter Schmuck will grade the performance of the Orioles in five categories. The letter grades are not directly tied to any particular statistic, but are representative of a cumulative evaluation of everything – tangible or intangible – that falls under that particular category